New Zealand in the Twentieth Century The Nation, The People - Paul Moon

As the first history to encompass the twentieth century in its entirety, Paul Moon’s new book, New Zealand in the Twentieth Century – the nation, the people signals a fresh approach to history-telling.

Rather than offering an academic time-line and cataloguing major events and dates, New Zealand in the Twentieth Century is more idiosyncratic in its approach  What emerges is more like a portrait of the country, developing layer upon layer through the decades as a British agricultural settlement matures into a conspicuously independent and developed Western nation.

It invites the reader to survey the historical contours of the country decade by decade, layer by layer, to gain an impression of the country’s evolving nature over the century.  It is the author’s intention that the reader will develop a real feeling for what it was like to live in New Zealand during those decades.

Not every episode explored in New Zealand in the Twentieth Century is the biggest, the best, the most disastrous, or the most profound to affect the country. Instead three types of events or episodes vie for attention:

·        those that were significant at the time of their occurrences;

·        those that in hindsight were influential in steering the country in the direction that it ended up taking;

·       and those that might otherwise seem trivial, yet convey some insight into New Zealanders, their lives and their environment at a given time.

For often, it is the small vignettes of everyday life that speak more about the atmosphere of a place or period than major political events.  During the course of the book, Dr Moon returns to particular subjects, such as garden or home design, where their evolution through the century offer way-points for international and local influences (such as the development of housing from kitset villa housing in the early part of the century, through to the Californian bungalow, the state house, open-plan living in the 1970s, to the Tuscan-style plaster houses of the late 1980s).

New Zealand in the Twentieth Century is an impressively researched and  readable history of life in New Zealand throughout the twentieth century.

About the author:

Dr Paul Moon is Professor of History at the Faculty of Maori Development —Te Ara Poutama —at the AUT University, Auckland where he has taught since 1993.  His specialist areas of research include the Treaty of Waitangi and the early period of Crown rule in New Zealand. 

Dr Moon is widely regarded as one of New Zealand’s foremost experts on the Treaty of Waitangi, and has published two bestselling books on the subject.  He has written biographies of Governors Hobson and FitzRoy, and Maori politician Hone Heke Ngapua.  In 2008, his book on tradition Maori cannibalism —This Horrid Practice — was released and followed up with the critically acclaimed The Edges of Empires. 

BOOK DETAILS:

New Zealand in the Twentieth Century – the nation, the people

by Paul Moon

Page extent – 672 pages, plus 8 page colour photo section and 16 page black-and-white photo section

NZ RRP $49.99 - Trade Paperback